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“Maybe you had to leave in order to really miss a place; maybe you had to travel to figure out how beloved your starting point was.”-Jodi Picoult

I feel like many times moving through sadness is like being in a crowd. People may be around you, but you’re so focused on just putting one foot in front of the other that you don’t even notice those around you. It’s like there’s a piece of glass between you and everyone else. You know they are there, but having the energy to reach for them, to need them…seems impossible.

That’s the thing about sadness. No matter how much we think it’s easiest to go it alone, it’s not. We all need support, every one of us. And maybe support doesn’t mean spoken advice or even being in the same vacinity as the person who’s hurting. Maybe support means finding comfort in silence, comfort through words that don’t even have to be spoken aloud to still be true. And no matter how much we run from people because we feel like dealing with our sadness is easiest alone, we always come back. Whether we come running back, or skulking back, we come back. Because facing sadness by having another person carrying some of the weight is 100 times better, without even having to crack open our hearts to watch the sadness seep out on to the floor.

Truest are the friends who need not speak a word to offer comfort. The ones who are there, and neither of you have to even say anything. It’s a bond that doesn’t need words or acknowledgement. It’s having the ability to find comfort in silence.